The present technology of the present disclosure relates to a fixing device and an image forming apparatus including the same.
Conventionally, there has been known a fixing device that is used in an electrophotographic image forming apparatus and fixes a toner image, which has been transferred to a sheet, to the sheet. This fixing device has a fixing roller pair. The fixing roller pair includes a heating roller and a pressure roller. At a downstream side of a fixing nip formed between the heating roller and the pressure roller, a separation plate is provided to separate a sheet from a peripheral surface of a fixing roller. The separation plate is arranged at a predetermined inclination angle such that its front end is positioned in the vicinity of the peripheral surface of the fixing roller. At a further downstream side of the separation plate, a conveying roller pair is provided to convey a sheet, which is discharged from the fixing roller pair, to the downstream side. Relative positions between the aforementioned fixing nip and a conveyance nip are various according to shapes and the like of a sheet conveyance path. For example, there has been known a fixing device in which the conveyance nip of the conveying roller pair is positioned at a heating roller side from a common tangent (a common tangent of the heating roller and the pressure roller) in the fixing nip of the fixing roller pair when viewed from an axial direction of the fixing roller pair.